The undersigned organizations and individuals submit this letter in response to price increases you took in 2016 on antiretroviral (ARV) drugs to treat HIV, and in advance of what has become a standard New Year’s practice of boosting Wholesale Acquisition Costs (WACs) for ARVs without regard to how that will affect patient access to these life-saving treatments. We also write to express concerns about future price increases for direct acting antivirals (DAAs) for the treatment of Hepatitis C (HCV), which are already priced beyond what insurers and people living with HCV can reasonably bear.

Included below, please find the U.S. Fair Pricing Coalition’s table documenting two years of increases, along with its pricing and access principles and requests. These issues are especially relevant in light of resulting cost-containment restrictions instituted by both public and private payers.

Since 2010, some ARV prices have even been raised twice in the same year, the most blatant example being Gilead’s dual hits in 2016 on Complera and Stribild, totaling 14.3% and 12.1% respectively. In all cases, the price increases exceed the rise in the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a measure of inflation, sometimes two to three times or more. They even exceed the medical CPI, which is always more than the overall CPI, arguably due in part to excessive drug prices. In fact, average annual ARV increases have ranged from 5% to 8% ­— even higher in some instances — while the overall CPI has averaged 2.5% per year over the past 10 years.

We also have overwhelming evidence that exorbitant drug pricing has resulted in hepatitis C (HCV) patients being unable to access DAA combinations, which achieve up to 99% cure rates with minimal side effects. As examples of resulting obstacles, payers have initiated specialty tiering, coinsurance, and prior authorization restrictions for HIV and HCV drugs, with additional cost-containment measures in place for DAAs, such as fibrosis scoring qualifications, prescriber limitations, sobriety requirements, and detrimental rationing among incarcerated individuals.

Generally ignoring urgent community pleas to refrain from any price increases, and certainly no increases over medical CPI, the companies listed here have raised prices as follows (the columns show percent increases in 2015 and 2016, and overall since FDA approval):

The FPC and signers of this letter firmly believe that upwardly spiraling drug prices are already beyond the limit of any conceivable justification, are unsustainable, and will further prevent HIV and HCV patients from accessing life-saving ARVs and DAAs. Thus, we urgently request that you agree to a two-year price freeze on ARVs and DAAs to offset, in part, the price increases of your ARV drugs since FDA approval, and the initial WAC prices of your Hepatitis C DAAs. We are aware of industry claims that no one actually pays the WAC price. However, we also know that all discounts start from that point, resulting in inflated, inconsistent, and unsustainable consumer prices.

If companies insist on instituting price increases, at the very most they should occur only once annually, no sooner than two years after FDA approval, and they should not exceed the overall increase in the medical CPI for the preceding year.

If any manufacturer of ARVs takes more than one annual price increase above medical CPI, or in the case of DAAs, any price increase whatsoever, we pledge to mobilize to notify and inform the public at every possible opportunity about any and all unreasonable and unfair pricing policies. President-elect Trump and Congressional leaders have provided bipartisan support for reining in excessive drug pricing, another pragmatic reason to curb your annual overreach. We urge you to heed these warnings, and reject any contemplated price increases.

• Institute a price freeze for all currently approved HIV and HCV drugs for the next two years, and for a two-year period henceforth from the date of FDA approval on all new HIV and Viral Hepatitis drugs.

• Thereafter, if you must, take no more than one price increase annually, and at no more than the rise of the medical CPI. In addition, provide the FPC with prior notice within the bounds of relevant laws, of the rationale for all price increases, and if possible, a call in advance to discuss any “potential” increase.

Access Programs

Robust access programs are a necessity to assist uninsured and underinsured individuals in obtaining necessary medications, and have become increasingly important for adequately insured individuals facing substantial out-of-pocket costs resulting from payer cost-containment measures. Even with a company’s commitment to such programs, further changes are necessary in order to adapt to the changing healthcare environment and the mounting burden of increasing drug prices. Nor can these access programs be used as an excuse for a company’s continued excessive pricing tactics.

• Where allowable by law, provide all privately insured individuals living with HIV and/or HCV with 100% coverage of all out-of-pocket (OOP) costs, including co-pays, deductibles, co-insurance or any other related charges for all HIV and Viral Hepatitis prescriptions, including mail order prescriptions. We make this request in light of reports from individuals throughout the U.S. who are not taking their medications because they cannot afford the rapidly increasing OOP costs.

• Donate to a highly functioning and qualified foundation pursuant to all relevant laws, particularly to assist Medicare Part D recipients who cannot use manufacturers’ programs to defray co-pays, co-insurance and deductibles, but who may seek assistance from such foundations to help with these costs.

• Continue use of HHS’s Common PAP Application Form, requesting no additional information from applicants than is already requested on the current form, and participate in HarborPath to foster ease of access to medications through your PAPs. Both help to streamline the multiple forms and programs that provide HIV and Viral Hepatitiis medications to low-income individuals without health insurance.

• Disclose to the FPC the number of patients on your HIV and HCV access programs (i.e., co-pay assistance and PAPs), and your eligibility formulas for underinsured patients in your PAPs. Provide transparency on your PAP website(s) about the eligibility criteria for underinsured individuals.

ADAPs

• Continue providing significant, additional discounts/rebates to ADAPs beyond those required by the 340B program for all existing and new ARVs and DAAs.

• Provide full rebates on partial payments made by ADAPs, as is the current industry standard and guidance from HRSA, pending any changes in HRSA’s final rule on the topic.